


voice of reason, voice of doubt

by DesertLily



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Canon Timeline, Canon-Typical The Spiral Content (The Magnus Archives), Character Study, F/M, Light Angst, No Dialogue, Not-Them Tim Stoker (The Magnus Archives), POV Sasha James, Platonic Romance, Sasha James Lives, Self-Doubt, Spiral Avatar Sasha James, The Spiral Fear Entity (The Magnus Archives), The Unknowing (The Magnus Archives)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-02
Updated: 2021-03-02
Packaged: 2021-03-14 09:07:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,332
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29789625
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DesertLily/pseuds/DesertLily
Summary: As everything around her falls out of control, all Sasha wants is to be able to trust herself.orTim gets replaced. Sasha spirals.
Relationships: Sasha James/Tim Stoker
Kudos: 13





	voice of reason, voice of doubt

**Author's Note:**

  * For [bisexualoftheblade](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bisexualoftheblade/gifts).



> A fic for a friend!

Timothy Stoker had eyes that were grey like a cloudy day (or were they the same colour as a cup of coffee with the smallest drop of milk?). He had sandy blonde hair that he kept long (or had it been dark and in a quiff?). His laugh was cold and unnerving (or was it warm and comforting like a hug?). He dressed somewhat formally (or did he wear Hawaiin shirts covered in the most ridiculous designs?). He...He... _ Sasha didn’t know anymore _ . She didn’t know a single thing about what Tim Stoker really looked or sounded like. Because he was  _ dead _ . He had been for so long and she hadn’t noticed. None of them had. 

In hindsight, maybe Sasha should have noticed something was wrong from the start. Her and Tim had never formally got together but there had always been something between them - not quite in love with each other, but something more than just friends with benefits. They had been friends for years and honestly? Tim had probably been the person that meant the most to her. 

After the Prentiss attack, all of them had changed. That was a given. Martin was a little more fussy. Jon had become the epitome of paranoid. And Sasha...Sasha had become more cautious; critical, even. But it was Tim that changed the most. It was as if his entire personality had been rewritten. He had grown more distant and serious. He had lost the spark that made him so definitively  _ Tim _ . 

When he broke things off with her entirely, Sasha was relieved in the worst possible way. It felt like a weight had been lifted off of her chest - like she had been freed. Only, she didn’t know what she had been freed from. She didn’t understand why the growing cavern between her and her best friend was such a relief. 

Sasha had seen TIm spiral before. She had seen what he was like when the memories of losing Danny got too much or when he got too angry at the world. She had seen Tim when he was overwhelmed. The way he was acting now...It was nothing like that. It was nothing like the person she thought she knew so well. 

There was no real fire to whoever Tim had become. He didn’t feel right - not in the same why Michael hadn’t but in a way that was just so utterly  _ wrong _ . But that was absurd.He still looked like Tim. He still spoke like TIm.  _ People just changed sometimes _ .

Though, it was still who Tim had become that kept her up at night. At least, Sasha liked to pretend that he was the reason behind her growing insomnia. It held more comfort than the reality. Her mind couldn’t quite settle on the prospect that Tim had just changed. It was like he had been distorted somehow; changed or displaced in some way. 

But that was silly. The voice at the back of her mind always assured her of such. This was still Tim.  _ People just changed sometimes _ . She needed to accept that. Nothing else was wrong. Why would she think such a thing? How could she doubt someone that had once been her best friend? No, Sasha knew she was just being silly about the whole thing.  _ People just changed sometimes _ .

No one else seemed as bothered by Tim’s change as her. No one gained any similar inkling of wrongness.Until Melanie King. Melanie was the only person that gave Sasha any hope that she wasn’t making everything up. Because when she came to give her second statement, she had been so insistent that Tim wasn’t Tim; that he had been someone entirely different before. 

For a moment, Sasha had found herself agreeing but that musthave just been out of some strange sense of hope or longing for the old Tim. Of course, everyone else brushed off Melanie’s comment as absurd so Sasha forced herself to do the same.  _ People just changed sometimes _ . There was nothing wrong with Tim. She needed to stop being so critical about him. 

Then it turned out Tim really wasn’t Tim. She hadn’t been as shocked as she should have been when that creature that had once dared to call itself Timothy Stoker chased after her and Martin. She wasn’t scared of it because hadn’t she known it wasn’t quite Tim this entire time? Hadn’t she known for certain yet given in to the doubt at the back of her mind? Why had she been so silly? Still, she found herself running from the creature that was not Tim with Martin. After all, she couldn’t leave him alone. She couldn’t let someone else be so easily replaced, could she? 

There was an odd sense of calm when she stepped into the strange corridor with Martin. It was a nonsense world of never ending hallways and doors to nowhere.  _ Michael _ , her mind supplied a name for it. Sasha wasn’t sure how she knew it was him but she did. For a few moments, her and Martin caught a glimpse of a woman; someone else lost within this nonsense world. But Sasha didn’t pity her. Instead, she found herself oddly satisfied with her fear. 

Things only seemed to grow odder and odder after that as she spiralled into the unknown. Tim was dead. Jon was wanted for murder. Melanie had joined the archival staff. Martin was (thankfully) Martin. Elias looked at her differently. It was that last one that really puzzled her. Before, he had treated her just as he did the rest of the archival staff but now there was something else. There was a mixture of curiosity and caution in his eyes whenever he looked at her. Whatever it was, Sasha was sure she didn’t like it. 

When the truth about the Entities was revealed to them all, Sasha had long since passed the point of being truly scared of them. They fascinated her and the effects they had on her life and the lives of those around her. The Stranger had killed Tim’s brother before later claiming Tim himself. But it was not the Stranger that called to her. It was the Spiral. 

When she found statements to read, they almost always related back to the Spiral. On the nights she was able to sleep, she dreamed of endless mazes with no real logic to them. It was always on the verge of becoming an obsession of hers. But Sasha had more important things to worry about. They all did. 

The Unknowing. 

The ritual of the Stranger. 

All of them wanted to stop it - none of them wanted the world to end. But Sasha’s reason for wanting to stop it felt so much more spiteful. It was revenge. It was revenge for the unjust death of Danny Stoker. It was revenge for traumatising Timothy Stoker before stealing him away. It was revenge for her best friend. It certainly had nothing to do with the same voice that had made her doubt her own reality whispering at the back of her mind. It had nothing to do with how that voice now fed her one hundred and one ways to dislike the Stranger and its attempt to rise to power. 

It was that voice that encouraged her to press down on the trigger in the House of Wax. Because even if she died stopping the ritual, Sasha would avenge Tim and maybe...maybe if there was something beyond death, she would finally get to see his true face again; to see the Tim she knew she should have remembered. But Sasha James did not completely die. 

When Sasha next opened her eyes, they were full of twisting shapes and colours as she was granted a new view of the world.The world had taunted her and made her doubt her own mind and reality. Why shouldn’t she do the same in return? Didn’t she deserve to do that? After all,  _ people just changed sometimes _ . 

**Author's Note:**

> Comments and kudos are appreciated or hmu @ desert-lily on tumblr


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